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How can I improve system performance without a fresh install of OSX?

Bacong

Bacong

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Mar 7, 2009
2,622
1,143
Westland, Michigan
My system (sig) has been relatively sluggish for a few months now. Right now I've only got Firefox, Snak, iTunes and Adium open and it's just prodding. It has a decent amount of ram that should be able to handle relatively easy computing like this.

So, my question is, what can I do? Should I just re-install? I wouldn't really mind doing that. I have all day off, and fresh installs are fun :D but I have a good amount of stuff on here. I have an external where all of my important stuff is, so a fresh install wouldn't be a bad idea in that way.

So, what do you guys think? This machine is pretty old but I'd like it to be snappy like it once was.

Are there little things I can switch off or something?
 
Your system doesn't have what I would call "a decent amount of RAM". These days, 2GB is pretty much the minimum, with 4GB being preferable for decent performance. Since 2GB is the max your system can take, I'd bump it up to that.
 
I agree with GGJ. Also if you have sites open with Flash content, it'll lag because Flash will use most of your CPU. I'd do a fresh install and then see how it works
 
GGJstudios said:
If that's the case, you should be happy with the performance. Why ask for suggestions to improve performance if you're just going to reject them? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Because I USED to be happy with the performance? Please, I assume I don't need to explain everything this explicitly :eek: My system SHOULD have enough ram for this.

Do you disagree? If I'm wrong, fine, but in my opinion just listening to music, web browsing and chatting, 1.25 GB of ram should be enough, especially on a Mac. IMO the obsession with RAM is because of how cheap it is. You really think I need 4 GB of ram for web browsing and chatting? When did that happen?

I'm not rejecting your suggestions. I'd just rather not purchase something if I didn't have to. I DO appreciate the suggestions.
 
I mean like, this system used to boot up in 45 seconds. Now it takes 2-3 minutes. I'm just not sure where it went wrong, you know.
 
I'd save the cash on ram, save up a bit more and sell the G4 and get a new computer.

G4s aren't last years technology, the last revisions of G4 (in laptops) was even old when Apple put them there, because they failed to make a G5 CPU that could fit a laptop. The PB 1.25Ghz was new in 2003.

The 1.25GHz simply doesn't handle websites with Flash, HD video or much of the other new stuff.
It doesn't help that apple are only are optimizing stuff for Intel these days.
I replaced my 1.5GHz powerbook june 2007, and my iMac G5 is really struggling with most tasks these days too.
 
Bacong said:
...My system SHOULD have enough ram for this.
Do you disagree? ....
Click to expand...
Yes, I disagree that 1.25GB of RAM is sufficient for what you're doing, if you want "snappy" performance. No, you don't need 4GB, but 2GB would make a noticeable difference. RAM is a very inexpensive and simple upgrade that would give you a bump in performance. That's why I recommended it.
 
Well, how big is your iTunes library? Mine is at 60GBs, and in activity monitor, I am using about 400MB of memory. I have 4GBs of RAM, so if you have a larger iTunes library, (and since you have only 1.25GB of RAM, 300MBs is quite a bit, almost 40%!) it will slow it down tremendously.

I have recommended this in a few other threads, but this months' issue of Mac Life has a wonderful article on how to speed up you Mac. There were things i didn't know, and i performed several of the steps (even though i just reformatted).

It is well worth the $5 or whatever it costs.
 
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